His expression softened. “Hell, man. You’ve had our backs since we were a bunch of dumb college kids. How can I not be there for you?”
He held up his hand.
We clasped hands, Arnold and Carl Weathers–style.
“Okay,” I said. “Send the Wardens up.”
Will vanished down the stairs. I grabbed a towel and mopped it over my sweat-soaked hair. I was only wearing basketball shorts. I needed a haircut and a shave. Now that I wasn’t moving, the evening’s windshould have been sending chills through me, but it just felt refreshing. I stretched a little, sensing the bruises strain across my back, but it only made me feel a little more alive. The Winter mantle made pain a nonfactor, and as the season advanced, it became increasingly difficult to ignore the simple animal pleasure of using my body.
Footsteps came up the stairs, light, clicking, and Ilyana the Warden appeared, wearing a lot of close-fit black under her grey cloak. She stepped out onto the rooftop and stared at me for a long moment, pale eyes raking over me.
“Like some kind of animal,” she spat quietly, contempt in her tone.
But she was staring at me, and holding herself in a way that if I didn’t know better I would have sworn was intentional. The Winter mantle took keen interest in her grace, her slender appeal. Her white-blond hair that would make her easy to see and hunt down in the dark. Her lips were maddeningly full and appealing, even without makeup, even twisted into a sneer.
I tried not to notice, but ever since Lara had planted one on me, my body had suddenly remembered that sex was a thing, and that fact had been annoying me on a regular basis. Never mind how the oncoming cold weather had woken the mantle, as it always did. I could feel it, like a hungry beast prowling around in my chest and my guts and my…elsewhere.
“Nice to see you, too, Miss Astinova.” I sighed.
“That’s Warden Astinova to you.”
I showed her my teeth. “Where’s Carlos, Warden?”
“He’ll be along,” she said coldly. She seemed to make up her mind about something and strode quickly toward me, her eyes bright, her body tense.
Part of me sensed a threat. Part of me sensed an opportunity. I could have reacted in a number of ways, but I chose to just arch one eyebrow and give her my disapproving look.
She was maybe a buck fifteen, maybe five foot four. I had her by a hundred and fifty pounds and almost a foot and a half. She stopped short of me.
Then she took a deep breath, stepped forward, and placed her bare hand on my stomach.
I let her.
She stared at me for a moment, frowning. Then shot me a suspicious glare.
“You don’t sense any black magic, eh?” I asked her, my voice a low growl. “Go a little higher or a little lower, and this could get unpredictable.”
She jerked her hand back as if she’d been burned.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“I’m sure you don’t,” I told her. I started taking steps toward her, and she began to backpedal, her face turning into a grimace of apprehension. I didn’t stop until the small of her back bumped up against one of the merlons in the castle’s crenelation. “Let me explain something to you, Ilyana,” I said quietly. “When you’re here, you’re here as a guest. If you take liberties touching me again, I’m going to take it as a betrayal of guest-right and throw you off my roof.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” she snapped.
“You’ve been duly warned about your breach of the ancient laws,” I said. “This isn’t White Council territory. Walk carefully.”
“Or?”
I smiled again, not pleasantly. “One way or another,” I said, “it’s time for you to get off my roof.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I will remind you,” she said in a low, hard voice, “that should I ever find you in breach of the Laws of Magic or Council policy, your already-signed death warrant will be withdrawn from suspension and handed over to the Blackstaff. And you will be executed.”
“You say that like I haven’t been here before,” I said. “With someone a hell of a lot scarier than you with his finger on the trigger. And here I stand.” I stepped back calmly and gave her a courtly little bow. “Good night, Warden.”
The door to the roof opened and Ramirez stepped out, stockier than usual in a winter coat beneath his Warden’s cloak. “Ilyana,” he said, his voice frosty. “Return to Edinburgh at once.”
Her pale eyes flashed and she strode from the roof, to the doorway and down the stairs. She slammed the door behind her.
